Roane State Community College’s Tennessee Small Business Development Center and the Oak Ridge Chamber of Commerce will offer a free seminar for small business owners and entrepreneurs who want a better understanding of starting a new business.

The seminar will be from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Aug. 29 in the Oak Ridge Chamber of Commerce offices at 1400 Oak Ridge Turnpike.

Contact Jutta Bangs at 865-483-2663 or jbangs@tsbdc.org to register or for additional information.

Editor’s note: Topix CEO Chris Tolles contacted Roane County News reporter Damon Lawrence this month for a story Lawrence was working on about Topix.com. Here is part of their conversation.Lawrence: Some complain your website let’s users post slanderous and defamatory comments anonymously and people that are being talked about have no recourse. What’s your response to that?

It took two years, but the authorities finally caught up with Rickey Kenneth Hubbard.

He faces 20 counts of criminal impersonation for allegedly duping people into believing the Tennessee Department of Correction had contracted with Yates Construction Co. to build a prison in Swan Pond.
Hubbard claimed to be the project’s construction manager.
Bracey Bahm got suspicious and contacted Kingston police on Aug. 15, 2011.

Roane County Master Gardeners will have an Aug. 24 workshop on preservation of the harvest and cool season gardening, the third workshop in a Sustainable and Edible Landscapes series.
Discussion includes food preservation principles and techniques, preventing insects from overwintering in the garden and other key cool-season gardening topics; a hands-on demonstration of food preservation techniques.
Lunch will be served; there will be a fee for workshop participation. Contact MGRoaneCounty@comcast.net or 919-5769 to register or for details.

Betty and Jim Wilson have around 20 butterfly bushes around their Kingston home that have attracted a swarm of butterflies this year.
Yellow and black tiger swallowtails were particularly attracted to the bushes one day last week.

Betty said she loves to garden but jokes she doesn’t know how.
“I try everything,” she said. “Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn’t”